(Originally posted on Digby’s Hullabaloo on January 4, 2025)

Real Life (Criterion)

This underrated 1979 gem from writer-director Albert Brooks presaged Christopher Guest & company’s mockumentary franchise by at least a decade. There is a direct tie-in; the screenplay was co-written by future Guest collaborator Harry Shearer (along with Brooks’ long-time collaborator, Monica McGowan Johnson).

Real Life is a brilliant take-off on the 1973 PBS series, An American Family (which can now be tagged as the original “reality TV” show). Brooks basically plays himself: a neurotic, narcissistic comedian who decides to do a documentary  depicting the daily life of a “perfect” American family. After vetting several candidates (represented via a montage of hilarious “tests” conducted at a behavioral studies institute), he decides on the Yeager family of Phoenix, Arizona (headed by ever-wry Charles Grodin, who was born for this role).

The film gets exponentially funnier as it becomes more about the self-absorbed filmmaker himself (and his ego) rather than his subjects. Brooks takes  jabs at Hollywood, and at studio execs in particular. If you’ve never seen this one, you’re in for a real treat.

Criterion does a bang-up job with the 4K digital restoration. Extras include new interviews with Brooks and with Frances Lee McCain (who plays Grodin’s wife) and an essay by film critic A. S. Hamrah.